chemslug

• chemslugMay 3, 2021, 9:54 PM

  3 points

  in reply to: Jozdien’s comment on: Thoughts on Re-read­ing Brave New World

  Thanks for your thoughts! I think you’ve put your finger on an important difference between how an individual experiences a society and what a society is capable of accomplishing. It’s the stunting in the second category that makes Brave New World a clear dystopia for me. As for the islands, their influence on the remainder of society is clearly told to be carefully limited and controlled. I think Huxley’s inclusion of the islands as havens for the dissatisfied greatly increases the ambiguity in how the society appears to a modern reader.

  Thanks for the pointer to your blog post. You’ve clearly thought a lot about this. As you predicted, I find your conclusion repugnant and dystopian, but I don’t have a knock-down argument against your train of thought.

Thoughts on Re-read­ing Brave New World

• chemslugApr 10, 2021, 1:52 AM

  4 points

  in reply to: Bird Concept’s comment on: Holy Grails of Chemistry

  I don’t have any inside information about what exactly prompted the publication of these pieces, but I don’t think it’s unusual for practicing scientists to have some idea of what’s possible if things go very, very right with their research. They’re often wrong, of course, and important discoveries are often important precisely because of unforeseen ramifications. The Acc. Chem. Res. papers are just speculations about potentially awesome destinations for existing lines of research.

  I think that the resistance to Hamming’s line of questioning came about because (a) the criticism was coming from an outsider, and (b) it’s kind of a bait-and-switch to ask someone what the most important problem in their field is and then laugh at them when they don’t immediately say “the thing I’m working on right now”. I’d be ticked off if someone did that to me, especially if I didn’t know them well beforehand.

• chemslugJan 10, 2021, 12:47 AM

  4 points

  on: Thoughts on Mustachianism

  Thanks for this post!

  To me, the early retirement option has always seemed like it was better suited to people who had unrewarding jobs that paid better than any of the jobs they would like more (for MMM, this was programming). On the other hand, even if you like your job it’s hard to see how having substantial savings in case of layoffs or unforeseen circumstances could be a bad thing (see Richard Meadows’ post on this point). Thus, like you, I’ve started leaning toward the “retire in your mind” option. I also find that the parts of my job I like the most require physical infrastructure that is effectively only accessible within institutions, so I favor a path that lets me retain access to that while not worrying about the periodic layoffs endemic to my chosen industry.

  I don’t think we can learn too much about what people want to do with large amounts of free time from what they have done during Covid. The pandemic has brought a new set of unpleasant constraints. Inability to travel or see friends and loved ones without inducing lots of worry and guilt might make you pine for office politics!

• chemslugDec 26, 2020, 3:35 AM

  6 points

  on: The Best Vi­su­al­iza­tions on Every Subject

  For biochemistry, I think the Roche Biochemical Pathways chart is awesome, if a little overwhelming:

  http://​​biochemical-pathways.com/​​#/​​map/​​1

  I don’t recommend using it to learn biochemistry but it’s pretty great to see it all laid out in one place like that.

• chemslugDec 26, 2020, 3:24 AM

  4 points

  on: The Best Vi­su­al­iza­tions on Every Subject

  For the field of chemistry, I nominate The Periodic Table of the Elements. I know it’s old but it really does capture a surprising amount of information in a visually pleasing format.

• chemslugDec 2, 2020, 3:31 AM

  8 points

  in reply to: johnswentworth’s comment on: [Linkpost] AlphaFold: a solu­tion to a 50-year-old grand challenge in biology

  I disagree with your assessment that structural biology is useless. Knowing the shape of a protein can be pretty important if you want to perturb the protein’s function by, say, finding or creating a small molecule that binds to it. Crystal structures or cryo-EM structures can shed a lot of light on how a molecule binds to its target, which in turn can suggest further modifications to try and make a tighter binder. It’s not clear to me yet how easy or hard it will be to simulate ligand-protein binding using AlphaFold. I’d lean toward ‘hard’ but maybe molecular dynamics simulations would dovetail well with a structure determined by AlphaFold.

Holy Grails of Chemistry

• chemslugSep 24, 2020, 10:06 PM

  4 points

  on: Vi­su­al­iz­ing the text­book for fun and profit

  I’m very glad to see that you’re learning organic chemistry! It’s a great subject for the type of exercise you’ve described, as it’s a very visual field of study. As you mention that visualization is a skill you’re working on developing in parallel with your organic chemistry studies, I’d recommend that you get ahold of a molecular model kit. It may sound silly, but having a physical model of a molecule in front of you can make a big difference in how long it takes to grasp why, for example, SN2 and SN1 reactions give different stereochemical outcomes.

  Organic chemistry can be a playful subject if you approach it with the right mentality (don’t believe what the pre-meds tell you, and don’t try to memorize your way through the first semester!). If you’re looking for ways to see how it impacts your life, try looking up the chemical structures of over-the-counter medications like aspirin, dietary supplements like vitamin B12 or taurine, or polymers like polyethylene terephthalate. Relating a structure to basic sensory data (the feel of a plastic bottle in your hand, the aftertaste of aspirin) can help the subject matter feel more relevant.

  Please feel free to reach out to me if you have questions about learning organic chemistry! It’s good to see someone posting on LW about a subject I feel qualified to comment on, for once!

• chemslugFeb 6, 2018, 3:27 AM

  7 points

  on: Ham­mer­time Day 6: Mantras

  “Don’t screw future self” is one that has served me well for more than a decade.